Archive for the ‘Canada’ Category

“Later this month, the countries of the world will gather in Durban, South Africa, to discuss climate change. The omens for progress are poor; the forecast for global warming is worse.So says the International Energy Agency, hardly a left-wing pinko organization but, rather, one that collects and analyzes information for energy-importing industrialized countries.

The IEA minced no words. “On planned policies, rising fossil-fuel energy use will lead to irreversible and potentially catastrophic climate change.”

“Irreversible and potentially catastrophic” are words not written lightly. They don’t come from the United Nations, the favourite target of the climate-change deniers and skeptics. They don’t pour forth from the David Suzuki Foundation, Greenpeace or the Sierra Club. Rather, they come from the blue chip of energy analysts, relied on by government and industry alike around the world.

The IEA, charged with tracking energy use, reported that, in 2010, emissions of carbon dioxide – the principal greenhouse gas – rose by 5.3 per cent. Little is being done, says the IEA, to “quench the world’s increasing thirst for energy in the long term.” Demand for oil, natural gas and coal continues to rise.

If these trends continue, the world will blow past the target most scientists – and the world’s governments – have said must be achieved if climate change is not to produce negative consequences. That target is a rise of 2 degrees Celsius. Ideally, greenhouse-gas emissions should be reduced sharply so warming doesn’t occur. But anything above that increase, say scientists, would bring on a series of very undesirable events. ”

“When he’s not on his farm about an hour outside Montreal, it is from that office that Mr. Martin, the man who fixed Canada’s fiscal mess in the 1990s as Jean Chrétien’s finance minister and gave rise to the Group of 20, is waging his many post-political battles. He chairs the Congo Basin Forest Fund, which aims to end poverty in the 10-nation region. He advises the Coalition for Dialogue on Africa, which examines critical issues facing the continent. He guides the Martin Aboriginal Educational Initiative, a not-for-profit organization he established to help native youth.

And these days, as governments and central bankers around the world grapple with punishing debt loads, painful public spending cuts and the shocks of the 2008 financial meltdown, his focus is on ensuring such a collapse doesn’t happen again. Frustratingly, he says, people aren’t grasping just how desperate the situation is.

“They think this is an American or British or European problem. It is today, but tomorrow it’s going to be a Chinese problem or it’s going to be an Indian problem. And there’s no reason to think that Chinese banks, Indian banks, when they’re as big as Citigroup, aren’t going to have the same problems.”

So here’s how Mr. Martin, who still advises the International Monetary Fund, would fix the world: “……

Complimentary article re Canada , the elderly and the Health Care Delivery System. See other post as well.

“Canada’s health-care providers are struggling to retool the system to meet the needs of an aging population that is often facing multiple, chronic medical conditions.

The phenomenon of the growing ranks of the frail elderly in need of different phases of care that often can be provided in the community did not exist 25 years ago. Yet the country’s health-care system remains mired in the 1950s, primarily focused on hospitals and with little in the way of community services to prevent the elderly from languishing in acute-care beds.”

Something has to be done in Canada re the demographically growing needs for elderly care and overall health care delivery and costs. Great to hear of some constructive working models that are achieving that.

“For cash-strapped provincial governments, the aging population is a concern because older adults account for a huge proportion of health costs in Canada. People 85 and older consumed $21,000 of health-care spending per capita in 2008, compared with just $1,700 for those between the ages of one and 65, according to the Canadian Institute for Health Information.

“Our main problem is that while the patients have changed, our systems have not,” Samir Sinha, director of geriatrics at the Mount Sinai and University Health Network hospitals in Toronto, said in a recent research paper.

CapitalCare is one of five provincially funded centres in Alberta that meet the complex needs of seniors by providing a doctor, nurse, physiotherapist, social worker and pharmacist, as well as recreational activities, all under one roof. The Edmonton site treats an average of 45 to 50 patients a day.

Manitoba has a similar program. The Program of Integrated Managed-care of the Elderly (PRIME) operates in Winnipeg, and the government plans to open a second centre in the city.

“It’s a specialty working with seniors,” said Judy Ahrens-Townsend, program developer and manager of PRIME. “They need holistic care and when they don’t get that, they end up in the system anyway getting care that’s not so effective.”

There are other examples where Canada is making inroads into dealing with seniors, the fastest-growing segment of the population.”

Shawn Atleo, the National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations (AFN) is getting and saying it right. When the FIrst Nations of Canada ARE clearly Nations in their own right , will we see a respect of their Peoples , culture , spirituality , history , language and contribution to the mosaic of Canada. Much more to be said on this and I expect that we will see a further shaping of their Soverignty in the ongoing future .

“The treaties that were written before Confederation, the international courts, and the courts in this country have affirmed that negotiations between a government and indigenous people should be on a nation-to-nation basis, said Mr. Atleo. “What we have yet to have is a government with the political will to honour and uphold the recognition of the treaties and of aboriginal title and rights,” he said.

The time has come for a complete transformation of the relationship between Ottawa and the first nations, he said. “And I am really hopeful that the signals that have been sent by the Prime Minister and our work here in Moncton will result in the kind of change that our communities have been working for … ” ”

Like this:

“Finding new and more sustainable ways of farming shellfish, and helping re-energize B.C.’s coastal aquaculture industry are the aims of an innovative research facility that brings students and researchers together in Deep Bay.

The Deep Bay Marine Field Station is an off-campus research facility of the Centre for Shellfish Research at Vancouver Island University that supports sustainable shellfish aquaculture development along with encouraging preservation of coastal ecosystems.”